CNBC reports:
Washington ordered the departure of non-emergency government employees from Iraq on Wednesday, after repeated U.S. expressions of concern about threats from Iranian-backed forces.
The U.S. State Department has ordered the pullout of the employees from both the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad and its consulate in Erbil, the embassy said in a statement.
On Tuesday, the U.S. military reaffirmed concerns about possible imminent threats from Iran to its troops in Iraq, although a senior British commander cast doubt on that and Tehran has called it “psychological warfare.”
The Administration’s reckless policies increase the risk of armed conflict&isolate the U.S. The President was wrong to withdraw from the Iran Agreement and he can’t draw us into war w/out authorization from Congress.
Acting alone makes America less safe. https://t.co/SaesS2QEbp— Amy Klobuchar (@amyklobuchar) May 14, 2019
This is sort of wow: UK Maj. Gen. Chris Ghika, deputy commander for strategy and information for the US-led counter-ISIS mission, tells Pentagon reporters “We don’t see any increased threat from [Iranian-backed militias] at this stage.”
— Katie Bo Williams (@KatieBoWill) May 14, 2019
@StateDept has ordered the departure of non-emergency USG employees from Iraq, both at the Embassy in Baghdad and Consulate in Erbil. Additional information on this alert can be found on the U.S. Embassy website at U.S. Citizen Services. https://t.co/iX96dAkyhT
— U.S. Embassy Baghdad (@USEmbBaghdad) May 15, 2019
For a president highly skeptical about his intelligence agencies and who said the Iraq war was the greatest blunder in U.S. history, the bellicose, intelligence-based moves in Iran are…surprising? https://t.co/KgyLbMF7pa
— John Dickerson (@jdickerson) May 15, 2019
The anti-Iran push has proved difficult even among the allies, which remember a similar campaign against Iraq that was led in part by Mr. Bolton and was fueled by false claims that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.https://t.co/DvRTKhyyMR
— Arthur Delaney (@ArthurDelaneyHP) May 15, 2019